


you're in a car with a beautiful boy (and then, at the kissing bridge)

by summerpassingby



Category: IT (Movies - Muschietti), IT - Stephen King
Genre: Eddie Kaspbrak Lives, I mean come on, M/M, i believe in the power of eddie having seen that r+e carved at SOME POINT in his life??
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-01
Updated: 2020-12-01
Packaged: 2021-03-09 18:41:46
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,019
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27810922
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/summerpassingby/pseuds/summerpassingby
Summary: Richie takes Eddie to the Kissing Bridge and, of course, gets to say what he's always meant to.
Relationships: Eddie Kaspbrak/Richie Tozier
Comments: 4
Kudos: 36





	you're in a car with a beautiful boy (and then, at the kissing bridge)

“I still think you should let me drive it,” Eddie frowns.

“Dude,” Richie turns his head to him. “Once my career turns to dirt, this is going to be the only asset I have left. I’m not letting _anyone_ drive it. _You_ can’t even walk.”

“Asshole. Technically my legs still work.”

Richie grimaces. “Give it a year.”

He ruffles Eddie’s hair. He can’t help it. What? In his wheelchair, Eddie’s the perfect height for it.

“So you’ll still be here? In a year?”

Eddie is working to let himself say it. Richie can tell. He is brave. Richie wants to hold him.

“I’d never leave you behind, Eds.” Oh. He is saying it. “You’re faster than me, anyways.”

“Much faster.”

“ _Much_ faster,” Richie amends. “I’ll drive you, though?”

This, along with ruffling his hair, is one of Richie’s new routines with Eddie. They don’t really go anywhere. Just around. It’s still one of the better things to do when you’re stuck in your shitty hometown trying to recover from getting stabbed in the back by a clown. Mondays, right?

Plus, Eddie likes the car. Richie could tell before he said anything. It’s the most Eddie car he’s ever seen, which makes his buying it have some sense in retrospect—fire-red, fast, and compact is about as Eddie as it gets.

Now that Richie remembers Eddie, everything makes sense in retrospect. But he doesn’t want to think about that yet. That’s for when they leave Derry—go back into the real world, where Steve still wants to know where the fuck Richie went with three performances and a talk show to go, where Eddie is—still married? Richie doesn’t want to ask.

He opens the door for Eddie, who winces standing up.

“You okay?”

“Relatively,” Eddie says with his eyes closed as he sits down in the passenger seat.

Richie folds his wheelchair and crams it in the backseat. The top is down, because the trunk is too small and it won’t fit otherwise. God—fucking Eddie. Richie can’t believe he ended up with this car. _I got this because of you_ , he wants to tell him. _I thought about you all the time, even when I didn’t know it_.

He takes him to the Kissing Bridge instead. It’s all muscle memory—the thirty years between visits feels like an afternoon. Then again, nothing in his life has felt really _real_ except for his time with the Losers. They are his friends, and more.

“The—” Eddie laughs softly— “the Kissing Bridge? Wow.”

Richie pulls off to the side. “Right? Major throwback.”

“Yeah,” Eddie blinks. “Hey, did you ever run by here with me?”

“Don’t think so,” Richie says as he grabs Eddie’s wheelchair. He knows he never did. His heart is picking up speed, and his palms are getting uncomfortably sweaty. _Eddie wouldn’t like to hold them like that_ , he thinks. Maybe he wouldn’t mind.

Eddie maneuvers himself into it without standing.

“Can I show you something?” This time it’s Richie who has to work to let it out.

Eddie shrugs. “’Course.”

“Okay,” Richie says, and doesn’t move.

“Rich,” Eddie says, softer. “It’s going to be fine, you know that, right?”

It’s Eddie, so Richie believes him. “’Kay, it’s over here.”

Richie thinks he might pass out before they make it there. Eddie should give him a turn in the wheelchair.

“No, I remember now, you never came with me, I always wanted you to—” Eddie trails off as they stop in front of the carved letters.

 _Oh God,_ Richie thinks. _This is the part where he finds me out._

“It was really you?” Eddie’s eyes wrinkle at the corners when he smiles now.

“Huh?” Richie says. He might still pass out.

“R + E, you were really the one who… I fucking knew it!”

Richie forgets any nerves. “You _knew?_ ”

“Well I _suspected_ , I was fifteen, I didn’t think— Jesus, Rich, I used to come running here all the time, of course I _noticed_ —”

Richie giggles.

“What?” Eddie draws it out a little.

“Nothing, man—” he can’t stop. “I can’t believe—” another burst— “I didn’t tell you.”

His stomach hurts a little now. Why didn’t he tell him?

Jesus.

Why didn’t he tell him?

He puts his hand on his mouth but before he can stop himself, he lets out a sob. “Why didn’t I tell you?”

He shakes his head.

“You’re _you_ , you’re— you know I was going to, I wanted to say fucking _something_ , man, but I didn’t, and when you got stabbed— God, I thought I was going to have to go my whole _life_ without telling you. I couldn’t— you don’t have to say anything, I know you’re married, whatever, I’ll get over it—” doubtful, but he says it anyways— “but I needed you to know. It was always you. You know I went out with Steve once? My manager, he was… jeez, he seemed so familiar, I always thought I’d seen him on the street somewhere before we met but it was _you_ , same height, not as good jokes, though. God, Eds… It was always you.”

“I hoped it was you.” Eddie’s quiet as he looks up at Richie. “I really did. You’re not… you’re not the only one.”

Richie scrunches his eyes closed. “My whole life, I missed you so much.”

There are tears running down Eddie’s cheeks, but he doesn’t look like he’s crying. He looks like the bravest man in the universe. “I was going to tell you.”

His voice is steady. “I was going to tell you, and then I couldn’t, and I thought I would die before I could, okay? Getting to hear you tell me… It’s more than I ever thought I would get. So much more.”

Richie nods.

“Okay.” His voice wavers a little as he says it.

Eddie’s eyes wrinkle, and the lines of his smile are deeper. His eyes are the same. “I like you a whole lot, Richie.”

 _Is it enough?_ Richie thinks.

Eddie answers without realizing, or maybe he does. “That’s all I need.”

He is steady as he says it. He always is. 

**Author's Note:**

> Wrote this in a rage-fuelled frenzy on Nov 19th after The Great Destiel Denial. Gays can come back from the dead and have a little drive in a car, as an anti-spn hate crime <3


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